Gillon aitken biography sample

( This tribute to the legendary literary agent, Gillon Aitken, was posted on 29 October on Patrick French&#;s Facebook page.

Aitken, Gillon Reid, 1938-2016 | The University of Tulsa Archival …

I have reposted the text and accompanying photographs here with his permission. ) 

Remembering the much-loved Gillon Aitken, who died this week.
He was born in Calcutta in and sent to boarding school in Darjeeling aged three; he became a spy, a translator of Pushkin and the publisher of Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene.

Forty years ago, he set up as a literary agent, based from home. I wrote about him a bit in The World Is What It Is, describing him as &#;haughty and charming, commercially ruthless but apparently patrician, a lone wolf who relied only on himself.&#; He was also clever, emotional and funny.

Gillon Aitken, book publishing agent, 1938-2016

For half a century, he was at the heart of the London publishing world. In Joseph Anton, Salman Rushdie describes being accosted by a reporter on his way out of a memorial service on the day of the Ayatollah&#;s fatwa. He asked for help:
&#;Gillon leaned